Bonfire at Thornburg House in the Uwharries
The Land Trust for Central North Carolina held a storytelling event in the Uwharries today. Designed with kids in mind, this big kid enjoyed the festivities as well. Starting mid afternoon we hiked out to the Cooper Mountain Cemetery, in the rain. When we arrived back at the recently restored Thornburg home, there was a fire blazing and food cooking.
Charlotte Ross (center) tells stories and legends
Held the day after Halloween, ghost stories were on the agenda. Professional storyteller and oral history historian, Charlotte Ross was the main attraction. We had to wait until a wonderful chicken barbeque dinner was cooked and served and the rainy day turned in a rainy night before Charlotte got going.
Amanita mushroom
She began by relating her own personal experience with a ghost, the ghost of her great grandmother telling little Charlotte where to find her grandmother's lost wedding ring.
From there she jumped to Appalachian legends. They were ghost stories too but she gave us the background of these stories. they were all based on true events and had been passed orally. Once a legend or story is written, it becomes fixed but the stories passed on beside wagon train campfires take on a life of their own. "Long Dog" was based on an actual robbery and murder of a family traveling in East Tennessee in a Conestoga wagon in 1805. It became a tourist attraction and spun off in many ways. She followed this with "Ghost Voice" based on another event which took place in the Asheville-Morganton area. Hunters hear a voice from the woods advising them not to build a fire in the rocks. Over 100 years after the actual event, a current account was reported in the Asheville Citizen in 1965. Finally, she told the legend of a West Virginia family murdered in 1865. Three young children were left in one of 67 limestone caves in the area. For several nights, locals heard babies crying from a cave but despite their searches, could not find the children. Over 100 years later a young couple moved into the home and the young woman found the skeletons in one of the caves.
The stories went well into the evening and it was quite late when I left for home.
Marbled Orb Weaver
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